These are two lists, arranged by area, of terrestrial lakes having a surface area greater than around 3,000 square kilometers (1,200 sq mi)[1][2].[3] not including lagoons and reservoirs.Certain lakes can have significant seasonal or annual variations in their area. This is particularly valid for salt lakes found in arid regions. Therefore, seasonal lakes like Lake Torrens (maximum area 5,745 km2, 2,218 sq mi), Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre (maximum area 9,500 km2, 3,700 sq mi), Mar Chiquita Lake (Córdoba) (maximum area 6,000 km2, 2,300 sq km), and Great Salt Lake (highest area, 1988, 8,500 km2, 3,300 sq mi) are not included in this list.All lakes as conventionally defined up to 3,000 square kilometers (1,200 sq mi) and the largest lakes according to a geological definition, wherein Lake Michigan–Huron (also known as "Huron–Michigan") is acknowledged as a single body of water and the Caspian Sea is regarded as a small ocean. Though it is mostly located in an oceanic basin (a piece of the ancient Tethys Ocean), the Caspian Sea is normally regarded as the largest lake in the world, unlike all other lakes that are wholly on continental crust.[4]* [5][6]—[7](8)The world's largest lake by surface area is Lake Huron, which is hydrologically connected to Lake Michigan despite being traditionally considered as two separate lakes.The Caspian Sea, which spans around 386,000 square kilometers (or 150,000 square miles) in surface area, is located in Eurasia and is the biggest inland body of water in the world. Three of the top ten largest lakes are found in North America, and five of them are a part of the Great Lakes. Eurasia was also home to the Aral Sea, the fourth-largest lake in the world until the second part of the 20th century. As late as 1960, the Aral Sea encompassed 68,000 square kilometers, or 26,300 square miles, of Central Asia. However, the Aral Sea had only a few remaining pools by the second decade of the twenty-first century due to the redirection of its incoming streams for agricultural purposes; this loss of the Aral Sea may be the most dramatic illustration of how human activity may permanently alter Earth's surface.As the world's biggest enclosed body of water, the Caspian Sea covers an enormous 389,000 square kilometers (150,000 square miles). At 1,119 kilometers (745 miles) in length and 1,025 meters (3,365 feet) in depth, this enormous body of water has a volume of 78,200 cubic kilometers (18,800 cubic miles). The Caspian Sea is a unique body of water that resembles both a lake and a sea. It is situated at the intersection of Eastern Europe, West Asia, and Central Asia.

Superior Lake and Victoria Lake, with respective lengths of 616 km and 322 km, are the second and third largest lakes in the world.